• Leaders could not agree on a proposal for a global bank tax, supported by the United States, Britain and the European Union but opposed by Canada and Australia.

• While the G20 reaffirmed a deadline – their next meeting, in November in Seoul – for agreeing on new capital standards for banks, they signalled that several countries might not implement the standards by 2012, as initially planned.

• By then the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, made up of international central bankers, will propose a road map. The US pushed for stricter new capital rules while the Europeans stressed the need for a phase-in period.

• European leaders have agreed to conduct stress tests on their big banks, an exercise successfully undertaken in the US last year, in an effort to restore market confidence.

• At China’s urging, the G20 leaders removed from their joint statement a proposed clause that would have praised China for agreeing to greater exchange rate flexibility.

• But the leaders did call for “greater exchange rate flexibility in some emerging markets".

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• Canadian Prime Minister
Stephen Harper
said he understood China’s wish not to be singled out, for either criticism or praise, but added: “When you make commitments on the world stage, you will be held accountable for them."

• The G20 endorsed a goal of cutting government deficits in half by 2013 and stabilising the ratio of public debt to gross domestic product by 2016. The targets were proposed by Harper, and backed by Germany and Britain.

• To assuage objections from the US, Japan, India and some other countries, the timetable was couched as an expectation, rather than a firm deadline. The G20 joint statement explicitly stated that Japan, which is heavily dependent on domestic borrowing, was not expected to meet the targets.

• The G20 outcome was a victory for Chancellor
Angela Merkel
of Germany, who argued that without actions to rein in spending, investors would drive up governments’ borrowing costs, as they did in Greece.